The Sleeping Olympic Fan

So this year I am having a hard time getting into the Olympics.

Every Olympic year, our TV is usually glued to the Games. We get that great patriotic feeling about the good ole USA and watch anxiously to see what the athletes are accomplishing. Who can forget Dan Jennings and his many falls and his compelling story to "skate for his sister"? He definitely showed that perseverance pays off and everyone rejoiced when he achieved his gold medal.

This year I am really blase about the competitions. There is no "Dan Jennings" type story. They tried to make the Michelle Kwan story or the Bode Miller story into a "we all care what happens" kind of thing, but it just didn't work out that way. They are even pathetically trying to make the Russian figure skater into a "Big Story". You know the old: "I'm old, I'm sick, I'm taking care of my sick mom, this is my third try to get gold kind of story." They barely mentioned this chick until Michelle Kwan quit.

Well, it almost seems unpatriotic to not watch the Olympics. I enjoy seeing hard work pay off and athletes giving their all.
I think that there have been moments of great accomplishments this year, but I for one have basically missed them. I am ticked off that all the good competition is on TV so darned LATE! I cannot seem to stay awake to see any of these shining moments.

I really enjoy watching the ice dancing and managed to stay awake to watch the short program. I think I stayed awake because there seemed to be an unusual number of falls...some of them pretty spectacular ones. I have missed most of the other late night competitions because of the sleeping factor. I sit down and before you know it, I am watching the back of my eyelids!

I will admit that my hubby and I are avid curling viewers this Olympic year. They put curling on TV at 8 AM and 5 PM so I am not sleeping during this timeframe! I have really been getting into the "excitement" the curlers show during their games! I still don't understand much of the scoring or strategy but they do all that yelling of weird things, look so serious, and seem to get into their games. How can you not like that? My hubby and I even had a discussion about curling around this area, and checking into this activity. On further review, that sounded like a pretty dumb idea. How cool could those curlers really be, and can you imagine me and the hubby in some curling club?? I think probably not!

Pretty soon these Olympic games will be over and we will have to wait a couple more years before we get to see them again. The TV coverage at those next games needs to do some readjusting of their lineup so we actually can get excited and watch the competition at a reasonable time. I miss that patriotic feeling and I don't want to be known as the SLEEPING Olympic Fan!